Local Government 2035: Strategic trends and implications of new technologies

This white paper was sponsored by SAFEbuilt and originally published by the Alliance for Innovation as part of their 2016 BIG Ideas conference.

From the introduction:

Technological advancements increasingly disrupt and destabilize markets, institutions, and organi– zations around the globe. A mere 20 years ago, Katie Couric asked “What is Internet?” on NBC’s Today Show.1 Today, the Internet is integrated into every aspect of our daily lives. And tomorrow, emergent technologies will drastically alter the landscape in which we live.

It is extremely difficult for regular people to predict the rate, scale, or impact of technological inno- vation. Henry Ford, who understood this principle, is famously quoted as saying, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” The ever-increasing rate of tech- nological innovation begs the question: how will government manage or adapt to the explosion of new technologies?